Grit Lab Report

Hi Jaron,

Welcome to your personalized Grit Lab Report!

We will go week by week, reviewing everything you have told us through Poll Everywhere.

We hope this will help you reflect on what you have learned and experienced during Grit Lab.

Important note!

Sometimes, you may not have been able to respond to all polls.

If the data for one of the polls is missing, the automatic report will display NA, or ““.

Okay, let’s get started!

The first half of Grit Lab delves deep intp the passion facet of Grit.

We like to call it Choose Easy, because we think gritty people pursue what they enjoy.

Putting it graphically, gritty people tend to pursue the intersection of these four circles.

The first time we met, you told us where you were on the grit rubric.

Regarding passion you picked .

Regarding perseverance you picked .

As you know, grit grows, so don’t worry if you are not yet where you’d like to be in your grit journey.

Hopefully, this class will help you become grittier each day.

In week 2, we looked at your interests.

Interest is an emotion, and it is the opposite of boredom.

Your interests are the activities or subjects that spontaneously grab your attention.

Trying things out and seeing how you feel is the best way to refine your interests.

In week 3, we studied values, your beliefs about what is important.

You said your top three values were universalism, self-direction, and achievement.

You wrote a “This I Believe” essay, and here’s where you located it on Schwartz’s value taxonomy.

When we talked about strengths in week 4, you said your personality strength was .

You said your top three talents were analytic, spiritual, and musical.

We then talked about goal hierarchies.

You said you had a general intuition (but nothing specific yet) about your top-level goal.

We discussed self-concordance, or how much a goal aligns to your deeply held values and beliefs.

A goal you said you will be pursuing for the next six months is to learning as much as i can .

Here is how self-concordant that goal was:

Don’t worry if your self-concordance for that particular goal is low.

It might mean that you need to reframe that goal in a way that makes it more relevant to your deep self, or change it!

Remember that self-concordance is goal specific, so other goals might be more self-concordant.

We then transitioned to the second part of Grit Lab:

Work Smart

In week 6, we looked at goal setting and planning.

You WOOPed!

For your Wish, what you wanted to accomplish, you said Actually do my readings .

For your Outcome, what would happen if your wish came true, you said I won’t be sad .

For you Obstacle, what it is within you that stands in your way, you said Too much dtufy .

For your Plan, you created this when-then plan to achieve your goal: A las cuatro en punto, voy a estudiar .

Whether you changed your WOOP or stuck to that one, here’s where it landed between being a total fail, and going exactly according to plan.

And here’s how much you learned

These goals are hard, and despite our best efforts, our plans can fail.

The important thing is that you learn something along the way!

In week 7, we talked about deliberate practice.

You shared you’ve done daily practice in Piano .

We learned that deliberate practice requires a challenging, hyperspecific goal, maximum concentration, instant feedback, and is often done alone.

In week 8, we discussed feedback.

Even though feedback can be hard to take, it is often the key to improve. So if you want to improve, seek it actively!

You said you felt Grateful when receiving critical feedback, and Grateful when receiving positive feedback.

We then turned to learning about stress.

In week 9, you reported feeling a lot of stress in your life right now, the primary source of it being ldr .

We also talked about adversity and failure.

Although related, adversity and failure are different:

Adversity happens to us, whereas failure is something for which we are generally more responsible.

However, how we interpret stress and failure matters…

Interestingly, research has found that people who believe that stress can facilitate learning and growth experience enhanced performance, well-being, and health.

And failure—not achieving a particular goal—can be interpreted as “I’m learning!” and lead you to look for the lesson in that experience.

We closed the Work Smart section of the class by talking about habits.

Throughout the semester, you practice habit building using your Build-A-Habit Guide book.

You describe the habit you chose as .

Whether you were successful in habit building or not, this is how much you learned.

Finally, what good is grit if we do not dream for others?

So, we transitioned to Paying it Forward.

In week 10, we looked at mentors: role models that take an active role in your growth.

Hopefully, your mentor was authoritative, being both supportive and demanding.

Here’s how you described them:

You also wrote a gratitude letter to .

In one word, you said it made you feel Grateful .

One way of paying it forward is having a prosocial, beyond-the-self purpose. Here’s how you responded to items assessing that.

… and so quickly we arrived at the end of the semester.

Here’s how your mood varied over these weeks.

Do you notice any patterns? Is there anything that correlates with your mood?

Here you can scroll through all the quotes you wrote to summarize each class.

Value
Personality can change, values can change, everything can change
If, then. Think about the obstacle not just the outcome
DELIBERATE PRACTICE! LOTS OF IT
Reduce ego threat
Just not good enough… yet
Don't use willpower, work smart
Care about others, make your mission and passion serve others, thats the most powerful motivator

In the final class, we looked back to everything we’ve learned together and to how our passion and perseverance evolved during this class.

Here are the comments from your Grit Lab Teammates:

Nathan Xu
Jaron, we will miss you when you return home! Your warm personality and diligent work ethic have made you an invaluable member of our team. It has been a pleasure watching you grow and evolve, especially in your resilient pursuit of your goals. Your determination and commitment have not only contributed to the success of our team but have also served as a source of inspiration for everyone around you. Wishing you all the best in your future endeavors - wherever they will take you. Learning about your forays into singing and musicals for your Discovery project was enlightening! I have been impressed seeing you make the absolute most of your time here at Penn, and performing in your first ever musical at a new school in a new country with a new accent is credit to your sheer tenacity!
Rebecca Kim
Jaron’s easy-going, playful, and genuine spirit has been such a blessing this semester. When he first joined our group, I remember being somewhat intimidated by his commanding and confident presence. However, from day one, Jaron would make little jokes and observations throughout the lecture and in our team/partner discussions that made me realize how playful and fun and not intimidating he was as a person. Further, while Jaron is immensely intelligent and witty, he is also thoughtful and tender-hearted. When we had to talk in pairs, Jaron would actively listen to all that I had to say (including the boring and the crazy). He never once made me feel too uncomfortable to share something; I always felt like it was a safe space when conversing with him. Even in our team discussions, Jaron always helped create this warm and inviting atmosphere, and I think his own willingness to be vulnerable/share contributed to that as well. When Jaron was first talking about his Discovery Project, I remember him describing how shy he was as a kid. I was honestly quite surprised because of how unafraid and outgoing he is today. I related to him, as I was and honestly still can be a shy girl in certain situations. However, Jaron gives me hope that it is possible to grow more into your skin, and even break barriers, as you understand and challenge yourself more. I am so grateful to have been placed as his desk buddy this semester. He most definitely made the class all the more enjoyable. Jaron’s Discovery Project was inspiring to say the least. He decided to pursue the one hidden interest he had been avoiding for so long: music(als). I got to learn about how he auditioned for both a cappella groups as well as musicals at the start of the semester, and he actually got into one of each! I admire Jaron’s ambition and eagerness to challenge himself in this way. He also used deliberate practice skills to improve his singing, dancing, acting, and performing skills, which was also quite remarkable seeing his dedication in becoming the best he can be on stage. Through Jaron’s project, I learned the importance of passion, direction, and effort in pursuing a goal and being gritty. Jaron’s work paid off, especially since I got to listen to him sing wonderfully in Penn Sori’s show this semester. I hope he continues to grow his musical interest and talent in the future.
Danny Weinberger
When Jaron joined our Grit Lab family, I couldn’t have been more excited. Jaron is hard-working, gritty (even while on a semester abroad) and he always knows how to make you smile. Jaron loves to learn and is never afraid to ask any question. Of the many insights I learned from Jaron is that it is never too late to explore new parts of yourself and expand your boundaries. Jaron’s cool demeanor has the ability to uplift your day and his sincere care for others has moved me to pay it forward and try to do the same. Thank you Jaron! Jaron’s Discovery Project was a voyage of faith that tested his courage. Jaron overcame confidence shortcomings in public speaking to ultimately become a singer in a play! Throughout the semester Jaron consistently grew and made an impact. He realized the unique opportunities here at Penn to improve and made sure to take advantage of them!

We hope you have emerged from Grit Lab a little grittier than you started.

Do you want to see how your grit rubric changed?

Drumroll please…

Don’t worry if the rubric doesn’t yet reflect growth. It is only a coarse measure that cannot replace your own self-reflection.

In any case, grit is not built in a day…

…remember that progress is never smooth…

…so stay passionate and persevering in the lifelong quest of choosing easy, working smart, and paying it forward.

With grit and gratitude,

Angela and the Grit Lab team.